At my workplace my co-workers and I are always hurrying, assisting each other with our joint tasks. We have a few rushed conversations, sharing instructions and concerns. When we are on break, however, we relax and tell each other stories, sharing in laughter and silliness.
Several of us have our mothers’ voices ringing in our ears: “clean up your plate. Don’t throw that out. There’s a little left in the jar.”
My own mom would be horrified that I throw out one of those individual margarine containers without scraping it out completely. I remember that she bought margarine in blocks, wrapped in waxy paper.
The brick was sliced for the butter dish and used for baking. She then used a rubber spatula to clean the paper thoroughly, then used it again to grease the heavy cast iron frying pan. Not a smear was left behind.
We had a few dairy cows but we sold the cream. We lived on skimmed milk and margarine. I can still smell that cream separator. Mom scoured it faithfully after each use. It was sanitized but having that contraption sitting in the kitchen seems odd to me these days. At the time it was a given on the farm. The cream was taken to town in a small cream can.
I think that Judy may have had the can? Or it may have been sold at the farm sale. The owner’s name was stenciled on the side. I know she did have one purchased at another sale of a well loved local, Wallace Brower. She had a connection with the farm. Her husband didn’t see the charm in that old container.
Another powerfully scented memory: fat rendering in a large pot on the back of the cookstove. That was a rancid smell and required open windows. Grandma rendered scraps of fat, making her own lard. It made up into flaky pastry despite the initial stench.
I think Grandma may have made soap as well. Her mother, Grandma Good, certainly would have. They had to make everything themselves. I have no recollection of soap production in my time. I do recall that for awhile mom saved all the bits of the bars of Zest, heated them in a tin on the burner and melted them all together. Some of our hand soaps were multi-coloured but perfectly usable.
Mom occasionally made new dresses for the three of us. She bought two different fabrics and made us each a two-toned, similar but not matching outfit. Our everyday dresses were hand-me-downs.
There was often clothing passed from another family or regular visits to the thrift store. Mom was a whiz at the Singer sewing machine. She remodelled, shortened and took in the side seams as needed.
Being the third in line, my clothes had been around awhile. When we entered home economics class in Grade 7 with Mrs. Conway, we were able to buy new material and gradually learned to make our own clothing. By then we had earned some babysitting money and didn’t use it frivolously.
Mom used worn out or damaged clothing to make elaborate quilts. Grandma had a few left from her mother, hand stitched with tiny bits of multi-coloured fabric. Crazy patch quilts were made out of necessity.
Mom favoured quilts made from patterns. I received a butterfly quilt, matching colours on squares of a different background. Judy’s was a more detailed “Dresden Plate.” Sadly the beautiful quilts made of new materials didn’t last as long as the ones made with recycled fabric.
Many of our meals were made of scraps as well. Initially an unlucky chicken met its end just as needed and graced our table within hours. We had many delicious chicken dinners, with mounds of mashed potatoes and gravy, garden carrots and peas and an assortment of pies. The carcass of the bird always simmered on the stove to get the last goodness and made a fragrant broth for soup. Mom made her own noodles as well. She canned chicken for a time but that was a messy job.
Eventually the folks were able to buy a huge deep freeze. A day was set aside to butcher several chickens and maybe a pig. I think the folks purchased a side or a quarter of beef. Mom’s freezer was kept full. She was a consistent baker: bread and buns, pastries, cookies. She labelled everything, dated it and included a brief note: “cloudy, first snow, bright and sunny.” It was cool to read her entries. Maybe that is where my tendency to journal came from.
I feel so blessed when I think of my beginnings. My parents, like everyone we knew, had to make do. They worked hard and gave us everything they could. Yet they provided fun things as well.
We remember playing baseball with the backstop Dad constructed. He made sure we had bicycles, used but in good condition. We went on many day trips. We often went to the Calgary Zoo, occasional trips to Banff, hiking around Bighorn Falls.
Sometimes on a country drive we stopped and investigated an abandoned farmhouse or a barn in the advanced stages of decay. Sometime dad halted the car to pick a few berries along a fenceline, using his cap if he lacked anything else as a container. He presented them to mom as a gift with a handful of buffalo beans that he found there too.
We had unlimited access to library books. We were allowed to have friends for sleepovers, even though our house was already stuffed. We enjoyed games night, movie night with mom’s delicious popcorn or grilled cheese and cocoa.
Mom made miraculous use of scraps all throughout our childhood. She and Dad never skimped on giving of themselves, though. Their love and guidance were a banquet: no scraps there.
